The Greatest
by wuemsel
Summary: Did you go to school with some jerk you just NEVER want to meet again? Well, Starsky sure did ...


This was inspired by a song of a German band about people you knew in school and you just don´t want to ever meet again ...  
  
I don´t own neither Starsky nor Hutch (*sigh*) and I´m not making any profit out of this!  
  
Enjoy!  
  
______________  
  
The Greatest  
  
"Does it still hurt?"  
  
"Will you stop asking?! Especially while you´regrinning like that!"  
  
"Oh, I´m sorry. I didn´t mean to ..." Hutch started, but couldn´t finish the sentence as he looked up from where he´d placed the empty cup of coffee next to the hard chair he was sitting on. Instead he giggled, once more, at the sight of his miserable looking partner.  
  
Starsky rolled his eyes. "Hutch."  
  
"I´m ... I´m sorry, Starsk, honest, but ... It´s just ..." He couldn´t help it.  
  
"Wow, so glad we´re in a hospital," Starsky stated as he watched his best friend practically double over with laughter. "If you´re gonna suffocate, there´ll be at least docs around to release you."  
  
"Buddy, I´m sorry," Hutch managed to squeek out, wiping tears out of the corners of his eyes and trying his best to still look sympathetic.  
  
"No, you´re laughing," Starsky corrected him unnervedly, rubbing the sore spot on his face where he´d hit the breakfast bar in his kitchen when he´d snapped his head up from where he´d been nursing his foot on which the can of beans had fallen that he´d tried to open with a can opener WHILE eating the last piece of cold pizza he´d found in the fridge. Of course he´d slipped, cut his hand and let the can fall down. THEN he´d hit his head and on top of that had turned just in time to let the right side of his already sore face connect with the pan Hutch had hold out for him to place on the stoven.  
  
It had all happened so fast, Hutch hadn´t even had time to warn him, just stood where he´d waited for Starsky to grab the pan, with his eyes wide - and despite himself started to ...  
  
"Will you stop laughing, damnit! I´m bleeding!"  
  
"I´m ... I´m sorry, Starsk, but ... You should have seen yourself when ... when that can fell down and ..." Hutch couldn´t continue. Though he was already on his knees next to his partner, pulling his hands away from the head wound to look at it, he was still laughing tears.  
  
"I know how I looked! I was there!"  
  
"Yeah. Right." Hutch was still laughing, merely managing to gasp out words. "Hospital. We need to get you to the hospital."  
  
"Aw, c´mon, you gotta be kidding!" Starsky protested, but flinched at the pain in his head.  
  
Seeing that his partner was really hurting, Hutch stopped laughing instantly and helped him to his feet, his mother-hen-modus kicking in at once. "I think you need stitches there, buddy."  
  
He couldn´t help a slight giggle to escape him as he looked at the can opener still on the ground, the piece of pizza next to it.  
  
"Ialways told you piza´s not good for you."  
  
"That´s so funny, Hutch."  
  
"I know."  
  
That had been half an hour ago. Since Starsky´s headache hadn´t increased, indicating that he was most probably not concussed and just needed stitches on his hand, they´d been told to wait in the waiting room, where they sat now.  
  
Feeling a little guilty about having laughed at his partner´s clumsiness - though, gee, what a show!!! - Hutch tried to make it up with standing to buy him a candy bar, just when a relatively young doctor showed up in the doorway, holding a chart, reading out loud: "Okay, next on the list is Mr ... Starsky! Davi..."  
  
He stopped, frowning at he looked at the name more closely. "David Starsky?"  
  
"Oh shit," Hutch heard his friend mutter from where he tried to practically disappear into his chair.  
  
"Starsk, it´s your ..."  
  
"Don´t move!" Starsky hissed. "Maybe he doesn´t see me."  
  
But it was too late.  
  
"Hey!" the young doctor exclaimed happyly, approaching the miserable detective with enthusiastic steps. "Davy!"  
  
"Cal," Starsky greeted the man with much less energy, forcing his unwilling lips to a dry smile. "Wow. So good to see you."  
  
"Yeah, you too!" the man announced as Cal nodded, his grin almost too much for his face to hold, and reached out to almost drag the smaller man out of his chair with his hand-shake. He stopped instantly, though, when Starsky let out a loud yelp as Cal had squeezed his cut hand.  
  
"Oh. Hey, nice gash you have there."  
  
"Thanks," Starsky muttered, drawing his hand back as if to protect it from further abuse. "So you´re a doctor, huh? That´s great."  
  
"Yeah. Graduated in Havard. And you, what´re you doing?"  
  
"Uh ..." Starsky started, throwing a very confused Hutch a very helpless look, when Cal interrupted him with a smile.  
  
"Oh, let me guess. Something with cars. Mechanic?"  
  
'Outch,' Hutch thought, wondering wherever on earth guys like Starsky and jerks like Cal could possibly meet. It didn´t take him long to figure it out, though. 'Of course. School.'  
  
"Cop," Starsky replied. "I´m a cop."  
  
Taking the opportunity, Hutch cleared his throat slightly.  
  
"Oh, and that´s my partner, Ken Hutchinson," Starsky introduced him. "Hutch, please meet Callum Billingsley. He´s a doctor."  
  
Briefly glancing at his partner, who mouthed a silent "Havard." behind Cal´s back, Hutch suppressed a chuckle and shook the man´s hand, muttering something about how nice it was to meet him.  
  
"So funny, Davy," Cal laughed, giving Hutch´s hand the shake he couldn´t really use on Starsky´s injured hand. "We went to highschool together," he told Hutch, who nodded in fake interest, having expected that.  
  
Looking back at Starsky, who by now had cradled his still bleeding hand to his chest, Cal shook his head sentimantally. "Wow, a cop. Who´d have thought. You guys are really out on the street and all that?"  
  
"Yeah," Starsky answered wryly, "you know me, Cal, I never learned how to read so I do the driving. Something with cars," he added in a tone that would have scared off every street-wise guy in the city, but since Cal had no clue about anything, he just laughed again, punshing his old schoolmate playfully on the shoulder.  
  
"You´re still a comedian, Davy. Always were."  
  
"Uh-huh."  
  
"But,gee, I´m talking here and you´re bleeding all over the place."  
  
Starsky winked sarcastically with his good hand. "Never mind, `sjust a trick I do."  
  
Mentioning for the two cops to follow him, Cal turned to lead them to an examination room, shaking his head as he laughed again. "You´re killing me, Davy."  
  
"Hm-hm," Starsky muttered, exchanging a look with his partner, who smiled in sympathy, fighting the urge to give Starsky´s shoulder areassuring squeeze.  
  
"So, sit down," Cal said as he closed the door behind them, placing the chart on a nearby table. "And I´ll take a look at that gash."  
  
Starsky sat down on the bed obediently, but hesitated before he stretched out his arm for Cal to see his hand.  
  
"So," Cal raised his voice again as he not very gently wiped the blood away from the gash, "how is it like? Being a cop, I mean. Do they really let you carry a gun?"  
  
Hutch briefly closed his eyes, his heart so full of pity for his partner he had to fight back the urge to grab Cal Billingsely and wipe the content smile off his face with his Havard diploma.  
  
But then of course Starsky´d be furious, so he kept his thoughts to himself, mentally wincing, though, when he heard his normally witty partner just mumble a "hm-hm" for an answer.  
  
"Really?! Wow, I think I better leave the state," Cal joked. He´d finished the cleaning and was rumoring through one of the drawers on his chair now, looking for something.  
  
Unfortunately, the task didn´t kept him from continuing to share his precious thoughts with his the two cops. "I mean, hey, you remember the party where you knocked yourself out with this ... what was it? A bottle- opener? I don´t know, but gee, I laughed tears that night!"  
  
Turning to Hutch, he added: "Honest, you should have seen it! What a Kodak Moment!"  
  
"I bet," Hutch muttered with a wry smile, suddenly feeling extremely guilty and glancing up at his partner, who looked like a sick puppy, yet forced himself to answer Cal´s smile.  
  
"Yes," he said in a voice completely toneless. "I remember it vividly."  
  
Cal didn´t even hear him. He´d stopped searching for whatever it´d been too, and was once more enjoying his role as the narrator of another embarrassing incident in Starsky´s party-youth.  
  
"I mean, honest," he finished, "he was one clumsy kid! I bet you shot yourself in the foot on your first day on duty!"  
  
Looking as if he was about to show Cal just how good he actually could handle his gun, Starsky once more smiled thinly. "I bet you bet."  
  
Again, Cal didn´t notice the strained tinge in the detective´s voice. He obviously lacked the ability of knowing sarcasm when it sprang into his face. "So what did you do this time?" he asked, closing the drawer without having taken anything out of it.  
  
Starsky paled visibly. "Ahm ..."  
  
"Some crazy gang members cut him," Hutch suddenly interrupted his stuttering.  
  
Cal turned to look at him, the smug expression fading from his face.  
  
Starsky´s chin traveled south as he stared at his partner with wide eyes.  
  
"Yeah," Hutch nodded at Cal´s disbelieving gaze, "we were chasing them down an alley. You know how these gangs are, right? They always run after those shootings in diners, and well, since we´d had lunch in there we thought it a good idea to follow them and teach them some manners. But you know Star... Davy, he´s always a little slow on the feet and all, so I suddenly find myself alone in an alley with all four," he frowned as if thinking, "no, five of them. But shooting a cop´s no fun when you can slide his throat, so all of a sudden there´s this kid with a knife and ... You know, I thought this is it. I´m toast. And just in that moment - Davy jumped from some roof or something, I don´t know how he got up there, onto the kid. Saved my life, that´s for sure. But unfortunately cut his hand. Right, Davy?"  
  
"Right," Starsky nodded, quickly adjusting his chin, when a very quiet Cal turned to look at him. "Don´t forget I bumped my head too."  
  
"Right," Hutch said frustratedly, "which is why we didn´t get `em, you know, Cal. With Davy out I didn´t dare go after them. But we´ll get them, won´t we, partner?"  
  
"Sure," Starsky winked, "right after we´re done here we´ll drive back and kick some ass. No one messes with my hand. I mean," he added, casting a direct look at Cal, "I need it. It´s the one I hold my gun with. So - am I done here? Cal?"  
  
"Huh?" Cal made, blinking as if clearing his head.  
  
"He asked if you´re finished," Hutch said calmly.  
  
"Oh. Uh, no. You ... ah, you need stitches and, ahm ... We´re out of needles in here." He pointed at the drawer he´d looked into a few minutes ago. "So - uhm, I´ll be right back to stitch you up, Davy ... Dave. And I´ll get you an ice bag for that ...bruise there too. Be right back," he repeated as he hurried out of the room, closing the door behind him.  
  
The two friends sat in complete silence for a moment, avoiding looking at each other. Starsky was the first to slightly giggle, and after a split second, both men were laughing so loud that it was heard throughout the whole building.  
  
THE END 


End file.
